'D램 달러'의 역설: 반도체 호황 속에 저물어가는 원화의 가치 > K-wave Trends

The most direct trigger for this high exchange rate crisis is the unusually large-scale withdrawal of funds by foreign investors. This year, foreigners have exited the domestic stock market by net selling nearly 120 trillion won worth of stocks. As the KOSPI index soared and the proportion of semiconductor stocks in the portfolio became excessively large, global funds pressed the sell button for mechanical rebalancing and profit taking. The demand for 'reverse remittance', which goes beyond simply selling stocks and immediately converts the sale proceeds into dollars and sends them back to the home country, is concentrated in the foreign exchange market, acting as a strong downward pressure on the value of the won.

A more serious problem is the 'DRAM dollar' phenomenon in which robust exports do not contribute to protecting the exchange rate. Just as oil-producing countries in the past supported dollar hegemony by earning dollars and reinvesting them in the United States, the enormous amount of dollars earned by Korean semiconductor companies is currently being reinvested overseas or held as dollar asset holdings rather than flowing into the country and being exchanged for won. Even export companies have adopted a 'lead & lag' strategy of holding dollars rather than selling them in anticipation of a further rise in the exchange rate, and the supply of dollars in the market has disappeared. In the end, even though the current account surplus was at an all-time high, the contradictory situation in which dollars did not circulate in the foreign exchange market became entrenched.

External geopolitical risks and the U.S. Federal Reserve's interest rate policy are also external variables that fuel the weakness of the won. As tensions in the Middle East increase, the preference for safe assets has strengthened, and as inflation indicators in the United States remain strong, the possibility of an interest rate hike within the year has raised its head again. This is leading to a rise in the dollar index and driving the strength of the global dollar. In this trend, the won is recording a particularly large decline compared to other Asian currencies such as the Japanese yen and yuan, which clearly shows how sensitively the Korean economy's external dependence and geopolitical risks are reflected in the market.

The foreign exchange authorities recognized the seriousness of the situation and formalized market intervention, but the prevailing assessment is that its effect is limited. Foreign exchange authorities, including Deputy Prime Minister Koo Yun-cheol, convened an emergency meeting and warned that speculative forces would be severely cracked, and ordered an investigation into illegal foreign exchange transactions and improved transparency in the offshore NDF market. However, market participants have a strong 'self-fulfilling expectation' that the exchange rate will continue to rise, and the government's verbal intervention alone is not enough to dampen the already strong upward sentiment. This is because the large-scale selling by foreigners based on real demand is a structural problem that is difficult to solve through artificial intervention.

Foreign investors’ foreign exchange hedging strategies are also compounded by the decline in the value of the won. Investors who recognize the growth potential of the Korean semiconductor market but are concerned about the decline in the value of the won are taking a dual position of holding stocks but selling the won to avoid exchange rate risk. As the interest rate difference between Korea and the United States widens, an environment in which hedge premiums can be earned has been created, and the efforts of institutions such as the National Pension Service to defend the exchange rate are being buried by the huge hedging volume of foreigners. Even though we have a solid weapon called semiconductors, we are blocked by the macroeconomic wall of exchange rates, and the actual perceived temperature of our economy is rapidly dropping.